The project is led by Prof. Linn Sandberg of Södertörn University (Sweden) in cooperation with Dr. Joanna Mizielińska, Prof. CC and Dr. Agata Stasińska of Collegium Civitas, and Rebecca Polsdam of Tartu University (Estonia).

The aim of this project is to explore how LGBTQ people in Poland, Estonia and Sweden, aged 50 and older, imagine their aging futures, what they understand as liveable later lives and how they adapt to aging through their everyday practices.

The project has theoretical origins in Sandberg and Marshall’s proposal (2017) that successful aging appears in cultural imaginaries primarily through images of heterosexuality, particularly through heterosexual intimacy and kinship. The project therefore also aims to enable the reinterpretation of imagined aging outside the heteronormative sphere.

IQAF also aims to bring more innovative methodological approaches to the study of aging and sexuality and to give a more significant role to the socio-cultural contexts of the Baltic countries. The project is based on a mixed methodology. Research material will be collected through focus groups, individual interviews and a creative method in which participants are asked to visualize how they imagine their old age in a format of their choice (e.g. poetry, film, photography). In addition, the project aims to empower aging LGBTQ people, both those participating in the project and the broader community, in the spirit of participatory sociology.

The project is funded by The Foundation for Baltic and East European Studies under grant agreement No. DNR 22-PR2-0015.